Saturday, 18 October 2014

Our family history: Joseph Wynne

Surprisingly, or maybe not, quite
a number of my ancestors are recorded in nineteenth-century Irish prison
records. Some were locked up for more ‘romantic’
crimes relating to the struggle for Irish independence, but more often than not it was
for petty offences like being drunk in public.
Luckily for us, the prison registers are packed full of genealogical information
that would not otherwise have survived and this is why you keep hearing about our
family’s historic misdeeds. It is not that ours was a particularly villainous family ­- it just did not take much to fall foul of the law back then.

In March 1902, my
great-granduncle Joseph Wynne, then forty-seven years of age, faced a seven day
prison sentence, just for getting drunk. He did not actually do anything else wrong,
apart from showing his face in public, having had one (or probably more) too
many. Joseph served his time in Dublin’s Mountjoy Prison, rather than pay the
extortionate ten-shilling fine.

The register for the prison confirmed Joseph was born in Thomas Street, Dublin, in about 1855 and while no record
of his baptism has been located, this address is in keeping with what is
already known about our Wynne family. John Wynne and Bridget Hynes, Joseph’s
parents, lived in Thomas Street from the time of their marriage in 1849, until
the 1870s.

Joseph was described in the
prison register as being five feet five inches in height and weighing 168
pounds. He had brown hair, grey eyes and a fresh complexion, with no
distinguishing marks. Joseph was a brush-maker by trade.

Strangely, Joseph named Patrick,
his younger brother and my great-grandfather, as his next of kin, even though
their father John was still very much alive at the time. Joseph was also recorded as
being a widower.

Ten years earlier, on 10 September 1892, Joseph had married
Katie Hosborough in St. Kevin’s church, Harrington Street. He was nearly twenty
years older than Katie. Tragically, two years before Joseph was arrested for
drunkenness, Katie died at Holles Street Hospital, a maternity hospital in
Dublin city. She was only about twenty-six years old when she died of syncope,
supposedly a transient loss of consciousness, but one she suffered for
eleven days before her death. Sadly, there is no record of any surviving children
from their marriage.

Joseph died of phthisis (T.B.)
on 22 October 1910 in Jervis Street Hospital.
His last address was 9 Kings Inns Street. His brother Patrick organized
his interment in the St Paul’s section of Glasnevin Cemetery.

When my great-grandfather organised the
burial, the cemetery recorded his residential address as 9 Kings Inns Street,
the same address as Joseph. Patrick was by then married with two children and registered
as the ‘inhabitant householder’ at 16 St James’s Avenue, off the Clonliffe Road.
This was the family’s home when his son Brendan was born in April 1908 and
when my grandfather Kevin was born in December 1909. It is therefore somewhat surprising to see
Patrick residing in Kings Inns Street and not in Clonliffe Road. This is especially so as,six months later, on
the night of the Irish census, Patrick was again recorded as living separately from his wife,
Teresa. He was lodging in Cork city, when Teresa (Carroll) Wynne and their children were visiting
her mother in Dublin. Patrick was known
to have travelled to Melbourne, Australia shortly thereafter, without his young
family, and resided there for some years between 1911 and 1915. I wrote about this here. So, did Patrick move in with Joseph, solely to take
care of him during his illness? Was it
merely convenient to provide one single address to the cemetery, when organising
Joseph’s funeral? Or, could Patrick and Teresa have been living separately in 1910 also?

Great work as usual Dara! I have one of those too, 3rd Great-Grandpa Cornelius Ryan was heading home from fair day in Tipperary Town (I deduce) en route to Goldengarden when he was nabbed in Grenane, he paid his fine.

Thanks Ellie, it was probably more usual for the fine to be paid in such minor crimes – poor Joseph, maybe he was not able to afford it – I do love the extra information provided by the prison register though!

About Me

Welcome to my blog! I'm from Co. Dublin, Ireland and now live in Co. Kildare with my husband, our three dogs and three horses. I love doing family history research and in this blog I would like to share my ancestors' stories. Do you have anything to add? Please leave a comment. I would love to hear from you.
My email address, if you prefer, is blackraven.genealogy [at] gmail [dot] com.